SUDAN: IRIN News Briefs [19990720]

SUDAN: IRIN News Briefs, 19 July

SPLA extends humanitarian ceasefire as peace talks begin

The rebel Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) on Monday
announced it would extend a humanitarian ceasefire
for another three months in the southwestern Bahr al-Ghazal
region, news agencies said. AFP quoted SPLA spokesman
Samson Kwaje as saying the ceasefire - extending one
that expired last week - would also cover the Bentiu,
Panaru and Pariang areas in western Upper Nile state
as well as Bor, Fangak, Waat, Akobi and Pibor districts
in central Upper Nile. The announcement was made on
the first day of peace talks brokered by the Inter-Governmental
Authority on Development (IGAD) in Nairobi.

Meanwhile, donors warned that it would be difficult
to continue humanitarian assistance operations in southern
Sudan if this round of talks did not achieve progress.
At the opening session of the talks, a group of donors
under the IGAD Partners Forum said funding would not
go on indefinitely. "We would like to draw your
attention to the fact that the current level of aid
flow from the donor community would be difficult to
maintain without tangible progress in the negotiations,"
news organisations quoted the Italian ambassador, Alberto
Balboni, as saying. The closed-door talks are set to
run for a week.

US to appoint special envoy to Sudan

US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has announced
that President Bill Clinton would "soon"
appoint a special envoy to Sudan. The envoy's job would
be to "focus on reducing human rights abuses,
improving humanitarian responses and revitalising the
regional peace effort led by Kenya," a statement
from the US Information Agency (USIA) said last week.
"This appointment is a clear signal of our heightened
commitment to help end Sudan's 16-year war," it
said.

Meanwhile, Sudan's Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail
on Friday said his government would "study"
the US decision to appoint an envoy, news agencies
reported. "Our evaluation will be based on the
principle of dialogue and keenness to normalise ties
with the United States and the person proposed to implement
the resolution," Reuters quoted him as saying.

IFAD development project in north Kordofan

A rural development project to assist close to 700,000
people in Sudan's western provinces of Um Ruwaba and
Bara will be financed through a US$ 10.5-million loan
provided by the UN International Fund for Agricultural
Development (IFAD). "The overall goal of the 7-year
North Kordofan Rural Development project and the target
communities is to assure their food security and enhance
the resilience of their way of life to drought and
natural disaster," an IFAD statement said. The
project will provide farming families, including women-headed
households, with technical, logistical and other support
for "productive enterprises" through training,
on-the-job experience and professional assistance.
Objectives include increasing the capacity of communities
to plan and manage their own development and improving
informal savings and credit systems, the statement
said.

Significant nutritional improvement found

Results of a nutrition survey conducted in several counties
of Bahr el Ghazal in April/May indicate an average
of 22 percent global malnutrition, according to OLS.
"This figure indicates a significant improvement
in contrast to the situation last year, but pockets
of serious malnutrition remain," OLS said in its
latest weekly situation report received by IRIN. It
noted that Aweil west county still had a number of
locations with high malnutrition but said "OLS
is addressing these areas."

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